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Keystone State Education Coalition
PA Ed Policy Roundup October 28, 2015:
Cyber Charters Have
'Overwhelming Negative Impact,' CREDO Study Finds
"Literally as though the student
did not go to school for the entire year" - new cyber charter report
HARRISBURG (OCTOBER 21, 2015) – The Campaign for Fair Education
Funding today submitted a formal request to Gov. Tom Wolf and members of the
General Assembly, urging them to promptly reach a budget agreement that enacts
the funding formula adopted by the state Basic Education Funding Commission
(BEFC) and increases basic education funding by at least $410 million.
Read the letter here: http://fairfundingpa.org/news/cfef-letter-to-legislators-a-budget-agreement-that-puts-students-first
Cyber Charters Have 'Overwhelming
Negative Impact,' CREDO Study Finds
Education Week
Digital Education By Benjamin Herold on October 27, 2015 12:00
PM
Students who take
classes over the Internet through online charter schools make
dramatically less academic progress than their counterparts in traditional
schools, according to a sweeping new series of reports released today. The National Study of
Online Charter Schools represents the first comprehensive national
look at the roughly 200 schools in the publicly funded, independently
managed cyber-charter sector. Such schools enroll about 200,000
full-time students across 26 states.
Reports jointly released by the Center
for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University,
the Center
on Reinventing Public Education, and Mathematica
Policy Researchfound that:
- More than two-thirds of
online charter schools had weaker overall academic growth than
similar brick-and-mortar schools. In math, 88 percent of
online charters had weaker academic growth than their comparison
schools.
- On average,
online charter students achieved each year the equivalent of 180
fewer days of learning in math and 72 fewer days of learning in reading
than similar students in district-run brick-and-mortar schools.
- As a group, online charters are
characterized by high student-to-teacher ratios, low student engagement,
and high student mobility.
- Online charters frequently offer
limited opportunities for live contact with teachers and a relative
paucity of supports for families, despite high expectations for parental
involvement.
- From funding to enrollment to oversight,
states are failing to keep up with the unique policy challenges that
online charters present.
Just about any way
the data were sliced—by racial and ethnic subgroups, for students in poverty,
by instructional and management model, compared to
brick-and-mortar charters—the story of weak academic growth in
online charters was largely the same.
Full CREDO 2015 Charter Study
Report here:
Center for Research on Education Outcomes Online Charter School
Study: Cyber charter
schools failing their students
MARTHA
WOODALL, INQUIRER STAFF WRITER LAST
UPDATED: Tuesday, October 27, 2015, 10:59 PM POSTED: Tuesday, October
27, 2015, 6:36 PM
A massive national
study of online charter schools has found that 70 percent of students at cyber
schools are falling behind their peers at traditional public institutions. The study, released Tuesday by three policy
and research centers, found the online schools have an "overwhelming
negative impact." Stanford University
"The online charter
sector is dominated two for-profit companies, which manage around two-thirds of
all cyber charter schools. The two largest such companies are K12 Inc., a
publicly traded education company, and Connections Academy
Online Charter Schools
Have An “Overwhelming Negative Impact,” Study Finds
More than 200,000 students are
enrolled in the online schools, but evidence suggests they are getting a very
bad education in return.
Molly Hensley-Clancy BuzzFeed News
Reporter posted on Oct. 27, 2015, at 3:30 p.m.
Online charter
schools, which enroll 200,000 students nationwide, have an “overwhelming
negative impact” on the academic outcomes of students by almost every measure,
according to a series of
sweeping national reports released today by three different policy and
research centers. Stanford’s Center for
Research on Education Outcomes, or CREDO, found that students at online charter
schools saw dramatically worse outcomes than their counterparts at traditional,
brick-and-mortar schools. Over the course of a year, cyber school students lost
out on the equivalent of 180 days of learning in math and 72 days reading, the
center said. In the most comprehensive
examination to date of online charters, CREDO found that more than two-thirds
of online charter schools had academic growth that was worse than traditional
schools. James Woodworth, a research analyst for CREDO, called the study’s
overall findings “somber” in a statement.
"Overwhelming Negative
Impact" doesn't necessarily percolate up to the folks receiving your
public tax dollars…..
Morningstar Executive Compensation for K12, Inc. (LRN)
Morningstar Executive Compensation for Pearson (PSORF)
And, as with Commonwealth
Connections, Advance plans to contract with Connections Academy of Pennsylvania
L.L.C. Baltimore London
New group with old
connections applies for cyber charter
MARTHA
WOODALL, INQUIRER STAFF WRITER LAST
UPDATED: Friday, October 23, 2015, 1:08 AM POSTED: Thursday, October
22, 2015, 5:04 PM
After rejecting all
new cyber charter applications in the last three years, the Pennsylvania
Department of Education received just one cyber proposal this fall. And the founding group is led by a former
board president of one of the state's 14 existing cyber schools. David N. Taylor last month submitted the
application for the Advance
Cyber Charter
School Commonwealth Connections
Academy Charter
School , a K-12 cyber based in Harrisburg that opened in
2002 and enrolls 8,800 students statewide.
Advance also would be based in Harrisburg ,
and its six-member board also includes Gail Hawkins-Bush, a veteran charter
educator who is also a former member of Commonwealth Connections' board.
"The National Alliance
National Alliance for
Public Charter Schools Responds to CREDO’s Virtual Charter Schools Report
National Alliance
for Public Charter Schools 10/27/2015
"Pennsylvania
Fayfich said cyber schools
should look more indepth into math and reading score. But he said it's also
hard to track progress, as most students only attend a cyber-charter school for
one year. "The
CREDO/Mathematica/Center for Reinventing Public Education report released today
on virtual education contains some good observations and some data that deserves
a deeper understanding, but there are also some overly-simplistic conclusions
and recommendations," he said."
Study: Cyber charter schools in Pa.
Jacqueline
Palochko Contact Reporter Of The Morning Call
October 27, 2015
Students who take
online classes through cyber charter schools, including those in Pennsylvania , perform
significantly less than their peers attending traditional schools, a national
study found. The study, which
said cyber charters have an "overwhelming negative impact" on
students, found some key findings comparing cyber charter schools to
traditional district-run brick-and-mortar schools, such as cyber schools seeing
fewer learning days in math and reading, having a higher student-teacher ratio
and limited opportunities for live-contact with teachers. The study was
jointly released Tuesday by the National Study of Online Charter Schools, the
Center for Research on Education outcomes at Stanford University Washington D.C. and 17 states, including Pennsylvania .
State senators will bug
out for two weeks starting Wednesday - should they stay and get a #PABudget
deal?
Penn Live By John L. Micek |
jmicek@pennlive.com Email the author | Follow on Twitter on
October 27, 2015 at 3:31 PM, updated October 27, 2015 at 5:09 PM
If you weren't
paying attention to the Pennsylvania Cable Network this Tuesday afternoon as
the state Senate went through its paces, then you probably missed this one: As is so often is the case, the 50-member
chamber adopted a resolution authorizing it to go into a recess from voting
sessions -- this time from Oct. 28 until Nov. 16. In general, these votes tend to be
pretty pro forma exercises and are passed with nary the bat of
an eyelash. But with the state
budget nearly four months late, minority Democrats offered an amendment
that would have kept the chamber continuously in session during that two-week
window. It didn't happen. The motion was
tabled. And the recess resolution, as it's known, was approved along party
lines Tuesday afternoon.
"Senate GOP leaders were
encouraged Tuesday when one Democratic senator, Andy Dinniman of Chester
County, voted with the GOP on a procedural measure to set-up Wednesday's
vote. But Dinniman said later that he's
not a definite 'yes' on the override.
His vote to put the override on the calendar for Wednesday, he said, was
intended more as a signal to the Wolf Administration of his frustration with
the impasse, and that he needs reassurance about the governor's plan."
Penn Live By Charles Thompson |
cthompson@pennlive.com Email the author | Follow on Twitter on
October 27, 2015 at 9:27 PM, updated October 27, 2015 at 10:16 PM
The next big pitch
in Pennsylvania 's
stalled state budget negotiations appears to be coming from the majority
Republican caucuses in the House and Senate.
But while that continues to bake over the next week or so, legislative
leaders will take one last, pre-election recess stab at loosening what would
amount to hundreds of millions of dollars for cash-starved school districts and
social service agencies. Senate Majority
Leader Jake Corman, R-Centre
County
Is compromise budget
possible in Harrisburg
Philly.com POSTED: Wednesday,
October 28, 2015, 1:08 AM
With the Pennsylvania
budget four months overdue, is compromise still possible in Harrisburg
Alan Novak is a former chairman
of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania
T.J. Rooney is a former
chairman of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party
Novak: We
might be closer than some people think. Republican leaders in the House feel
that they have anywhere from 15 to 17 Democrats willing to vote on a
legislatively created budget. That would probably be enough to override a veto.
Rooney: What Alan
describes is the fundamental problem in Harrisburg .
It represents more of the same. Unfortunately, where we are now doesn't reflect
a better budget. Rather, it's about making a parochial deal with a handful of
Democrats while leaving the rest of Pennsylvania
behind. Somebody gets a shiny new fire truck and the rest of Pennsylvania gets hosed. I still believe
that there is a pathway through negotiation that will do better for everyone.
Their view | Break budget
impasse with charter school reform
Centre Daily Times Opinion BY REP. JAMES ROEBUCK October 28, 2015
James Roebuck represents the 188th
Legislative District in Pennsylvania
You wouldn’t pay $10
for an apple or a loaf of bread. So why should you overpay for tax-funded,
privately run charter schools? The
urgency of passing strong charter school reform in Pennsylvania has only grown in recent weeks,
due to two major news stories:
• the state
budget impasse and
• revelations
that charter schools in Philadelphia
alone have racked up nearly $500 million in debt, all of which could ultimately
be the responsibility of taxpayers.
I recently issued my
third annual report on charter schools, outlining the problems and potential
solutions. You can read it at http://is.gd/2015CharterReport. The good news is that the $160 million or
more in potential savings from passing strong charter school reform could help
fill the gap that has left Pennsylvania
without a budget for more than three months. It would be a sizable step toward
closing the structural deficit and restoring school funding. It would also
amount to at least six times more than the savings from a Republican bill (H.B.
530) the House passed on party lines in March.
In Harrisburg
JOHN BAER, DAILY NEWS POLITICAL COLUMNIST Wednesday,
October 28, 2015, 12:16 AM
IF THERE ARE any
pluses to Pennsylvania 's
budget stall, now headed toward its fifth month, one might be that ordinary
voters (for a change) are asking questions about state government. And that can raise
basic issues, help explain the stall and, in a more perfect world, even lead to
reforms. For example, a recent email
from Joe B. asks if the folks who can't get 'er done in the Capitol are still
getting paid. He notes, "People
seem to care more when it affects them." Joe, of course
they're still getting paid, except for Gov. Wolf, who donates his salary to
charity. Which means his salary's still being paid, just not to him. See, all tax dollars are being collected even
though not all tax dollars are being spent.
Democrats dominate spending
in $9 million Pa.
WHYY Newsworks DAVE DAVIES OFF MIC A BLOG BY DAVE DAVIES OCTOBER 27, 2015
By the time they
cast ballots next Tuesday, Pennsylvania
voters will have been bombarded with more than $9 million in TV advertising for
and against the seven candidates for the state Supreme Court, according to an
analysis of media spending. Three of the
seven posts on the seven-member court are up for grabs, meaning that the election
could determine the partisan balance of the court for years. Democrats and their allies account for more
than three-quarters of the spending. Roughly a third of those funds comes from
independent groups supporting one party or the other.
Mayor Nutter calls for
dissolution the School Reform Commission [updated]
BY DALE MEZZACAPPA, PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC SCHOOL NOTEBOOK
OCTOBER 27, 2015 THE NOTEBOOK
In a major
education policy speech this morning, Mayor Nutter called for the
dissolution of the School Reform Commission and the return of a local board of
education.
"Of all the
policy recommendations I make today, none will have a bigger impact on Philadelphia than a
return to local control," he told an audience of invited guests at WHYY.
After 15 years,
Nutter said, "It's time for the experiment to end."
In addition to
shifting power to a nine-member, mayorally appointed board, Nutter called for
school advisory councils at every neighborhood school.
"While I
believe that the SRC and its many members have functioned to the best of their
abilities and with good intentions, we Philadelphians deserve to govern our own
schools," Nutter said. "A return to local control would give us real
authority over the education of our children." He laid out a plan
that would complete the transfer of power in September 2018. Conditions for the
changeover would include "full funding for public education" by the
state and a "student-weighted" education funding formula. This would
allow the district, he said, to "adhere to its five-year
financial-stability planning process that demonstrates the district's
structural balance." Then there would be
a year of "public hearings on governance, debates, and forums on how best
to improve education," said Nutter. "Only then will we be in the
right place to govern our schools locally."
Nutter on SRC: 'Time to
go'
MAYOR NUTTER
yesterday called for an end to the School Reform Commission, the state-mandated
board created to oversee the Philly school district. "It is now time to end the School Reform
Commission in the city of Philadelphia .
It's time for it to go," Nutter told an audience of education leaders
during an education-policy speech at WHYY studios. The SRC was established when the state took
over management of the district under a state law known as Act 46. Nutter has
proposed that the process of returning control to the city begin in 2017 and
that by September 2018 the locally controlled school board should be in place. "While I believe that the SRC and its
many members have functioned to the best of their personal and professional
abilities, there's no question about that, and with the best of intentions, we
Philadelphians deserve to govern, oversee and manage our own schools," the
mayor said.
Domb, Gym deserve endorsements
Inquirer Letter by Brian M. Villa Posted: Wednesday, October 28, 2015,
1:08 AM
Mayor Nutter's exclusion of Democratic primary winners Allan Domb and Helen Gym in his endorsement of City Council candidates ("Nutter's backing hits a nerve," Oct. 21) illustrates the paradox of his using reform rhetoric while practicing preservationist politics. Domb and Gym, through their respective business, education, and community endeavors, have established records of leading by example and creating new kinds of politics and public policies in the areas of local taxes, public schools, and jobs. Such freely given public-service efforts helped to establish credibility in the minds of many, resulting in their candidacies for at-large seats.
Mayor Nutter's exclusion of Democratic primary winners Allan Domb and Helen Gym in his endorsement of City Council candidates ("Nutter's backing hits a nerve," Oct. 21) illustrates the paradox of his using reform rhetoric while practicing preservationist politics. Domb and Gym, through their respective business, education, and community endeavors, have established records of leading by example and creating new kinds of politics and public policies in the areas of local taxes, public schools, and jobs. Such freely given public-service efforts helped to establish credibility in the minds of many, resulting in their candidacies for at-large seats.
"The prize comes with
$10,000 for Jackson Jackson
National principal of the
year from Phila.
KRISTEN A.
GRAHAM, INQUIRER STAFF WRITER LAST
UPDATED: Monday, October 26, 2015, 11:42 PM POSTED: Monday, October
26, 2015, 4:06 PM
One of the buses for
the kindergartners' field trip was late. No one could locate an interpreter to
translate for a Chinese-speaking parent. And a first grader smashed his head on
the playground - with no nurse on staff, was it a 911 call? At the center of all this was the woman named
the best principal in the country Monday - Lisa Ciaranca Kaplan, the
high-energy leader of Andrew Jackson Elementary, a neighborhood public school
at 13th and Federal Streets. Kaplan
handled the crises like a triage surgeon: locate the bus and a another parent
who spoke Chinese, assess the first grader, then call 911 to be on the safe
side. (The little guy has a nasty bruise but will be OK.) And then, she gave herself a minute to bask
in having captured the 2015 Escalante-Gradillas Prize for Best in Education.
Trib Live By Tony
Raap Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2015, 10:33 p.m.
Teachers in the Peters Township School District will walk off the job at 7 a.m. Wednesday after failing to reach a contract agreement Tuesday with negotiators for the district. “I am very disappointed with the union leadership's decision to strike,” district Superintendent Jeannine French said. “This will not bring us any closer to resolution, and the decision to strike will only hurt our children and families.” Paul Homer, a staff representative for the Peters Township Federation of Teachers, confirmed that the union's 200 teachers, counselors, librarians and nurses would strike, but declined to comment further. The teachers' contract expired Aug. 31.
Teachers in the Peters Township School District will walk off the job at 7 a.m. Wednesday after failing to reach a contract agreement Tuesday with negotiators for the district. “I am very disappointed with the union leadership's decision to strike,” district Superintendent Jeannine French said. “This will not bring us any closer to resolution, and the decision to strike will only hurt our children and families.” Paul Homer, a staff representative for the Peters Township Federation of Teachers, confirmed that the union's 200 teachers, counselors, librarians and nurses would strike, but declined to comment further. The teachers' contract expired Aug. 31.
The district and the
union have met 17 times since they began contract negotiations in March.
NAEP:U.S.
Fourth-graders and
eighth-graders across the United
States lost ground on national mathematics
tests this year, the first declines in scores since the federal government
began administering the exams in 1990. Reading performance also
was sobering: Eighth-grade scores dropped, according to results released
Wednesday, while fourth-grade performance was stagnant compared with 2013, the
last time students took the test. And
the tests again show large achievement gaps between the nation’s white and
minority students as well as between poor and affluent children, an indication
that the nation’s disadvantaged students are not gaining ground despite more
than a decade of federal law designed to boost their achievement. Researchers have long cautioned that it is
difficult to identify the cause of any fluctuation in scores on this testing
program, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which is also
known as the Nation’s Report Card. But many people look to NAEP scores as an
important barometer of U.S. student achievement because they are the only exams
that have been given nationwide over a long period of time, capturing the
performance of rich and poor children of all ethnicities in urban, suburban and
rural communities.
NAEP:
Nationwide Test Shows Dip in Students’ Math Abilities
New York Times By MOTOKO RICH OCT. 28, 2015
For the first time
since 1990, the mathematical skills of American students have dropped,
according to results of a nationwide test released by the Education
Department on Wednesday. The decline appeared
in both Grades 4 and 8 in an exam administered every two years as theNational Assessment of Educational
Progressand sometimes called “the nation’s report card.” The dip in scores
comes as the country’s employers demand workers with ever-stronger skills in
mathematics to compete in a global economy. It also comes as states grapple
with the new Common Core academic standards and a rebellion against them.
"This is the tragedy. It
has distracted policymakers’ attention away from the extensive research showing
that, in a very meaningful way, achievement is caused by opportunities to learn. It has diverted them from
the truth that the achievement gap is caused by the opportunity gap. Those advocating for today’s
policies have pushed policymakers to disregard the reality that the opportunity
gap arises more from out-of-school factors than inside-of-school factors."
NAEPscuses: Making Sense
of Excuse-Making from the No-Excuses Contingent
A commentary
from NEPC Director Kevin Welner October 28, 2015
However, as Dr. Bill
Mathis and I explained eight months ago in an NEPC Policy Memo, it is
possible to validly assert, based in part on NAEP trends, that the promises of
education’s test-driven reformers over the past couple decades have been
unfulfilled. The potpourri of education “reform” policy has not moved the
needle—even though reformers, from Bush to Duncan , repeatedly assured us that it would.
YouTube by Robert
Amsterdam Published on Oct 26, 2015
The international
law firm of Amsterdam & Partners LLP held a press conference on Monday,
October 26, 2015 at the National Press Club in Washington
DC to announce their engagement on behalf of
the Republic of Turkey
to assist in the global investigation into the activities of the U.S. based
Gülen Global Network.
DAMAGING THE CHARTER
SCHOOL BRAND
The Merrow Report October
27, 2015 John
Merrow Uncategorized
DAMAGING THE BRAND
Charter schools and
their networks desperately need a HALL OF SHAME. What’s more, the push to
create it should be coming from the charter school community.
I have been
observing what is called the ‘charter school movement’ from Day One, a historic
meeting at the headwaters of the Mississippi River
in 1988 that I moderated. Back then, the dream was that every district would
open at least one ‘chartered school,’ where enrollment and employment would be
voluntary and where new ideas could be field-tested. Successes and
failures would be shared, and the entire education system would benefit.
That naive optimism
would be laughable if it were not for the harm that has befallen many students
and the millions taken from public treasuries by some charter school operators
(regardless of whether their schools are ‘for-profit’ or ‘non-profit).’
As I see it, the
term is in danger of becoming toxic, and I think the blame falls squarely on
the leadership in the charter school movement, and on politicians who are
indifferent to the needs of children but responsive to constituents motivated
by ideology or greed.
Of course, the
movement has a HALL
OF FAME, to pat each other on the back and share success stories, so why
not establish a HALL OF SHAME?
Who’s ripping off
the system? Who belongs on a Charter School HALL OF SHAME? Here’s a
smattering of stories from a few states.
No Child Left Behind: What
Worked, What Didn't
NPR.org by CORY
TURNER Morning
Edition OCTOBER 27, 2015 4:29 AM ET
Cross
your fingers. Congress is trying to do
something it was supposed to do back in 2007: agree on a rewrite of the
Elementary and Secondary Education Act. It's not controversial to say the law
is in desperate need of an update. The
ESEA is hugely important, not just to our nation's schools but the social
fabric. It pours billions of federal dollars each year into classrooms that
serve low-income students. When President Lyndon Johnson first signed it in
1965, he declared the law "a major new commitment of the federal
government to quality and equality in the schooling that we offer our young
people." The ESEA is supposed to be
updated every few years but hasn't been rewritten since 2001, when another
Texan, President George W. Bush, famously renamed it No Child Left Behind. Bush
took Johnson's original vision, to help states level the playing field for
students living and learning in poverty, and added teeth.
This Just In: A Commercial
Network News Show Airs a Report on Education Policy
Education Week
Education and the Media Blog By Mark Walsh on October
27, 2015 9:38 AM
Earlier this month,
when President Barack Obama held a press conference to acknowledge U.S.
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's intention to step down, I gently chided the White
House press corps for showing absolutely no interest in the news of Duncan 's departure or of
education policy in general. (Although,
I did note that Obama gave reporters an out, since headdressed other news of
the day before opening up the press conference to questions.) So fairness probably calls for recognition of
a report on the "NBC Nightly News" Monday about school testing by the
network's senior White House correspondent, Chris Jansing. The report was tied
to the Saturday announcement from the White
House and the Education Department urging schools to consider ways to cut back
on testing, which Education Week's Alyson Klein reported in the
Politics K-12 blog. "Now the Obama
administration is saying, 'Enough,' calling on schools to cut back testing to
no more than 2 percent of classroom time," Jansing says in her report.
"It's a major reversal, to fix a problem they admit they helped
create." Since it's rare for any
kind of serious education policy topic to make it onto the commercial networks'
(ABC, CBS, and NBC) evening news shows these days, NBC News gets an A for
effort.
In
a conservative corner of Arkansas
Graduation
rate for English language learners rises to 94 percent, as all students improve
The Hechinger Report
by MEREDITH KOLODNER October 23, 2015
“A parent asked a
question,” recalled teacher Martin Resendiz, who was there to translate. “‘I
know you’re telling me that she’s the counselor, but what is a
counselor?’ And right there I just froze. That simple question, what is a
counselor, what does she do?” In that
moment, Resendiz, 23, understood that language was only one barrier among many
for the hundreds of families who had recently come to Rogers from other countries. Host to Walmart’s world headquarters, a
cluster of chicken processing plants and a growing local economy, northwest Arkansas has gained a
reputation as a place where new immigrants can get jobs.
With the influx of
workers from Mexico and
Central America, the Rogers
school district has become 44 percent Latino, up from 31 percent, in the last
decade. Of its 15,000 public school students, the percentage of those who
aren’t fluent in English has grown to 35 percent from 25 percent over the same
period. And because the jobs that have attracted so many people are mostly low
wage, the number of students living near the poverty line has more than doubled
since 2000. But in this deeply conservative
corner of Arkansas
— where no Democrat has been elected to Congress since 1966 — whites have not
fled the public schools. No angry billboards have cropped up. Even as some
Americans applaud presidential candidate Donald Trump’s denunciations of
Mexican immigrants as gang members and rapists, Republican Rogers has taken a
different approach. The schools have
welcomed and integrated the wave of immigrants, legal and undocumented
alike — and graduation rates have soared, for all students.
Testing Resistance & Reform News: October 21 - 27,
2015
Fairtest Submitted
by fairtest on October 27, 2015 - 1:20pm
To understand why
President Obama and Secretary Duncan were compelled to admit that there is too
much standardized testing in U.S.
public schools, scan this week's news clips with stories from fully half the 50
states. Across the country, parents, teachers, education administrators, school
boards and community leaders have built powerful campaigns to roll back test
overuse and misuse. Growing support for assessment reform is forcing
politicians to act. Even if their first moves are largely symbolic, more
tangible victories will follow if political pressure continues to escalate. (Back
issues of these weekly updates are archived at: http://fairtest.org/news/other)
WESA Public Forum:
Equitable Education Funding Nov. 9, 7 pm
Pittsburgh
WESA By EBAISLEY • October
27, 2015
Governor Tom Wolfe
has proposed spending 6.1 billion dollars on basic education, yet Pennsylvania is one of
just three states that does not use a formula to distribute funding to local
school districts. What is the best and most equitable way to allocate state
education funding? How can educators and lawmakers ensure a fair education for
all students?
90.5 WESA will convene a "Life of
Learning" community forum November 9 at the Community Broadcast
Center
Panelists include State Senator Jay Costa, member of the Basic Education Funding
Commission; Ron Cowell, President of the Education Policy and Leadership
Center; Linda Croushore, Executive Director of the Consortium for Public
Education; and Eric Montarti, Senior Policy Analyst for the Allegheny
Institute for Public Policy; and Linda Lane, superintendent of Pittsburgh
Public Schools. 90.5 WESA’s Larkin Page-Jacobs will moderate.
WHAT: Community Forum on Equitable Education
Funding
WHEN: November 9, 2015, 7 PM
WHERE:Community Broadcast Center 67 Bedford Square , Pittsburgh PA 15203
COST: Free. Register to attend.
WHEN: November 9, 2015, 7 PM
WHERE:
COST: Free. Register to attend.
Register Now for the Fifth
Annual Arts and Education Symposium Oct. 29th Harrisburg
Thursday, October
29, 2015 Radisson Hotel Harrisburg Convention Center 8:30 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. Act
48 Credit is available. The event will be a daylong convening of arts education
policy leaders and practitioners for lively discussions about important policy
issues and the latest news from the field. The symposium is hosted by EPLC and
the Pennsylvania Arts Education Network, and supported by a generous grant from
The Heinz Endowments.
SCHOOL CHOICE: THE ROLE OF THE
CONSTITUTION AND THE COURTS IN IMPROVING EDUCATION
Free for
Members • $7 teachers & students • $10 public
Become a Member today for free admission to this program and more!
Click here to join and learn more or call 215-409-6767.
Become a Member today for free admission to this program and more!
Click here to join and learn more or call 215-409-6767.
Does the
Constitution guarantee an “equal education” to every child? What do the U.S.
and Pennsylvania Constitutions say about school choice, teacher tenure,
standardized testing, and more? The Constitution Center hosts two conversations
exploring these questions.
In the
first discussion, education policy experts—Donna Cooper of Public Citizens for Children and Youth, Mark Gleason of the Philadelphia School
Partnership, Deborah Gordon Klehr of the Education Law
Center, and Ina Lipman of the Children's
Scholarship Fund Philadelphia—examine the state of Philadelphia public
education, what an "equal education" in Philadelphia would look like,
and their specific proposals for getting there. They also explain what, if anything,
the Pennsylvania state constitution says about these questions, and how state
government interacts with local government in setting education policy.
In the
second discussion, James Finberg of Altshuler Berzon
and Joshua Lipshutz of Gibson Dunn—two
attorneys involved in Vergara v. California, a landmark dispute
over the legality of teacher retention policies—present the best arguments on
both sides and discuss what's next in the case. They also explain what the U.S.
Constitution and major Supreme Court cases like Brown v. Board of
Education, San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez and Parents
Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 say
about education and our national debates.
Register now for the
2015 PASCD 65th Annual Conference, Leading and Achieving in an Interconnected World, to be
held November 15-17, 2015 at Pittsburgh Monroeville Convention
Center.
The Conference
will Feature Keynote Speakers: Meenoo Rami – Teacher and Author
“Thrive: 5 Ways to (Re)Invigorate Your Teaching,” Mr. Pedro Rivera,
Pennsylvania Secretary of Education, Heidi Hayes-Jacobs – Founder and President
of Curriculum Design, Inc. and David Griffith – ASCD Senior Director of Public
Policy. This annual conference features small group sessions focused on:
Curriculum and Supervision, Personalized and Individualized Learning,
Innovation, and Blended and Online Learning. The PASCD Conference is
a great opportunity to stay connected to the latest approaches for innovative
change in your school or district. Join us forPASCD 2015!
Online registration is available by visiting www.pascd.org <http://www.pascd.org/>
NSBA Advocacy
Institute 2016; January 24 - 26 in Washington ,
D.C.
Housing and meeting registration is open for Advocacy Institute 2016. The theme, “Election Year Politics & Public Schools,” celebrates the exciting year ahead for school board advocacy. Strong legislative programming will be paramount at this year’s conference in January. Visit www.nsba.org/advocacyinstitute for more information.
Housing and meeting registration is open for Advocacy Institute 2016. The theme, “Election Year Politics & Public Schools,” celebrates the exciting year ahead for school board advocacy. Strong legislative programming will be paramount at this year’s conference in January. Visit www.nsba.org/advocacyinstitute for more information.
PASBO 61st Annual
Conference and Exhibits March 8 - 11, 2016
Hershey Lodge and Convention Center, Hershey, Pennsylvania
Hershey Lodge and Convention Center, Hershey, Pennsylvania
Interested in letting our
elected leadership know your thoughts on education funding, a severance tax,
property taxes and the budget?
Governor Tom Wolf,
(717) 787-2500
Speaker of the
House Rep. Mike Turzai, (717) 772-9943
House Majority Leader Rep. Dave Reed, (717) 705-7173
Senate President Pro Tempore Sen. Joe Scarnati, (717) 787-7084
Senate Majority Leader Sen. Jake Corman, (717) 787-1377
House Majority Leader Rep. Dave Reed, (717) 705-7173
Senate President Pro Tempore Sen. Joe Scarnati, (717) 787-7084
Senate Majority Leader Sen. Jake Corman, (717) 787-1377
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